


Walking The Line

by thegrimshapeofyoursmile



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types
Genre: Ace!Roy, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Depression, F/F, Flashbacks, Friendship, Insomnia, Lesbian Sex, M/M, Modern AU - No Alchemy, Nightmares, Panic Attacks, Physical Disability, Platonic Relationships, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Sexuality Crisis, Trauma and Healing, War Trauma, and i‘m pretty sure i forgot some tags, look there is sex in this okay
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-14
Updated: 2021-03-19
Packaged: 2021-03-22 21:47:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30045216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegrimshapeofyoursmile/pseuds/thegrimshapeofyoursmile
Summary: I’ll get you out of here, he’d told her, so steady and sure, but sometimes she was not sure whether he’d ever made it out of there himself.*****Modern AU with no alchemy where Riza and Roy try to heal and get their shit together a few years after returning from war. Having fallen into a routine that threatens to slowly, quietly destroy them by rooting them on their spot, new people burst into their life and turn everything upside down - hopefully for the better.
Relationships: Edward Elric/Roy Mustang, Riza Hawkeye & Roy Mustang, Riza Hawkeye/Winry Rockbell
Comments: 1
Kudos: 20





	1. Eyes Wide Open All The Time

**Author's Note:**

> Uh yeah, this totally got out of hand as most of my projects do, but you‘ll get it anyway. Focuses heavily on the platonic relationship between Riza and Roy because I love both of them to death, but that does not mean that Winry and Ed won‘t play a large (yes, pun intended) role in this.  
> Another note concerning Roy‘s lawyer aspirations: I orientate myself after the Austrian lawyer education, which means you study 3 years for your bachelor degree, then do at least five months of training at a court and then work for 2-3 years at a law firm before your lawyer exam.
> 
> The title of this thing and the title of the first chapter are from Halsey‘s _I Walk The Line_ , which really screams Riza and Roy to me. 
> 
> **Warning** for the first chapter: mentions of alcohol abuse (Roy), war-related flashback (Riza).

Riza had the vague notion that her day would turn into a disaster when it started with her finding Roy fully clothed in his empty bathtub, knees drawn to his chest, face hidden against them and a half-empty bottle of Jack next to him. At least he had had the foresight to put away the shampoo bottle beforehand; they did not need a repeat of the last incident where he had reached for the wrong bottle and realized his mistake a little too late.

She breathed out, standing in the doorway, then she tried to assess the situation.

It was not a flashback, otherwise Black Hayate would have alerted her; he was _her_ service dog, but his unfailing loyalties had caused him to extend some of his attention to Roy, which she did not find very surprising. Then again, the dog was worried enough to lie on the rug in front of the bathtub and lift his head as soon as she entered the room, wagging his tail. Roy did not move, which was another worrying sign. He was not crying either, which was a better sign. No crying, no shaking, no sweating, and yet he was drinking at six in the morning - had probably been drinking for a while, since she knew that the bottle had been full the day before.

Riza resisted the urge to simply smash the bottle over his head and sighed, then settled down next to Black Hayate, folded her arms on the rim of the bathtub and put her chin on top of them. “Is this your breakfast?“

It took him a moment to reply and when he did, his voice was hoarse. “Maybe.“ 

“Nightmare?“ Sometimes they echoed. Not as much as they used to even just a year ago, but they still did. She knew.

“No.“

“Did you sleep at all?“

No reply. Riza closed her eyes, felt the strain in her back from the position she was in and did nothing to alleviate the dull, faint pain. At least it made her more awake. She tried not to be impatient, but it was a bad series of weeks for both of them. Too little sleep, too many irritations, and it all had led to her feeling very keenly that she was not in the right mind space to be of aid right now. But she could not leave him alone right now. Would never. 

He never asked her to, but he never had to. She did it anyway.

Still. It was hard to tell how long Roy would be like this, and she had places to go. He had, too, but Riza doubted that she would get him out of the house today. She sighed, lifted her head and got up to at least do what she could.

“Hand me that bottle,“ she said firmly. 

With a deep sigh, Roy slowly unfolded his own position and reached for the bottle to give it to her, not meeting her eyes. Dark stubble on the lower half of his face. His one eye was bloodshot and he was wearing the eyepatch, which was another reason to suspect that he had not slept for a decent 36 hours by now. It was kind of sad that by now Riza was an expert in reading small clues like that. Then again, she knew that it was the same the other way round.

“You‘re going to take a shower,“ she said, “then you‘re going to eat breakfast, brush your teeth and go back to bed.“

“I think I’m a failure,“ he said.

Riza paused. She eyed him, but he was staring at his scarred hands. “Roy. You‘ve literally gotten your lawyer‘s degree two weeks ago after graduating within the minimum of semesters required.“

And he had not been happy since then, she suddenly realized. She could not even say why, or why she had not noticed earlier. But he had not been happy since then and now he was even unhappier. 

“Why do you think you’re a failure?” she asked a little gentler than before. 

But Roy sighed in that way that meant that he was already clamming up, and when he lifted his head and gave her a faint smile, it merely confirmed her expectations. He could have been a great actor, too, if he had not been someone who would always have high ambitions to change the world, whether he wanted to or not. 

“Nevermind,” he said softly before rubbing his cheek. “I’m just tired.” 

Riza eyed him for another moment, then decided to simply let the matter drop. “Do as I told you then, you’ll feel better.”

Another faint smile. He was trying very hard for her and all things considered, she could appreciate it. “Yes, dear.”

Riza sighed a little, but she was tired, too, and she could not gather the gentleness he would have needed right now, so she did not even try. He still made no move to get out of the tub, so Riza merely smiled at least as faintly as he did. Accompanied by Black Hayate, she left the room to move through the short hallway into the vast room at the other side of the apartment that doubled as their living room and kitchen instead. It was pure luxury, this penthouse at the edge of town. Big windows usually made both of them nervous, but this apartment was on the tenth floor of a building and all of its windows were bulletproof; Riza knew because she had tried in one of the first, entirely sleepless nights after they had moved in. And even if they had not been, they probably had the best alarm system in Central City as well as an array of security cameras placed all over the apartment. So there was this beautiful, huge panorama window in the kitchen-cum-living room that doubled as a door and led out to a patio, spilling the day’s first golden sunlight over the warm, wooden floor under her feet. 

For a moment, Riza simply stood and breathed. There was a tightness in her chest she could not get rid of and she felt a slight headache, but she has always been fond of the very early hours of morning when the world still felt fresh, ready to be conquered. Another deep breath that eased the tightness a little, then she went to the coffee maker and poured enough ground coffee and water into it. While the liquid started to drip into the pot attached to it, she quickly fixed two bowls of porridge and started to eat hers with her back against the counter, cool stone digging into her hipbone as she looked out of the window and did not taste anything. Food was important. After seven years of canned military rations and the permanent taste of sand in their mouth, both she and Roy had had to relearn how to enjoy it; on bad days, even the texture felt wrong to her without the desert stretching out endlessly around them. 

She ate quickly and mechanically, swallowed, scraped the last remains out of the bowl and licked the spoon. In the distance, she could see the mountains. On the other side of the apartment, the shower went out. Next to her, the coffee maker finished its job. 

Riza put her bowl and spoon into the dishwasher, then went for the bottle of whiskey, uncapped it and drained its contents into the sink. The empty bottle wandered into the trash bin, then she bent down to take Black Hayate’s already empty bowl and give it a quick rinse. She had fed him after their daily morning run around four a.m. that always gave him quite the appetite. Black Hayate slowly wagged his tail, becoming more enthusiastic as she reached out and scratched him behind his ears with a smile before she got up again and poured two cups of coffee. At this point it probably did not matter whether Roy digested some caffeine or not; either he would sleep, or he would not. Sometimes upholding the routine was more important than other things, as they both had learned the hard way.

When Roy came into the kitchen, barefooted and with the same faded t-shirt as before, she put his cup and bowl on the table in the middle of the room, then ran her hand through his still-wet hair when he sat down heavily, a pack of smokes in one of his hands.

“Outside,” she said, even though he did not need the reminder.

“Yes, dear,” he replied with an overly dramatic, deep sigh and started to eat.

Riza patted his head, silently glad to see that he at least was not in too much of a bad shape to be unable to perform the most basic tasks. “I’ll be back in the evening. Call me if you need anything.”

“Have fun at work,” he told her, and this time his smile was something small and more genuine.

She briefly squeezed his shoulder, then got her handbag, keys and the leash before she left him there, his smile already slipping from his lips as soon as she had turned her back on him. That was alright. He would make it through the day nevertheless, and sometimes that was the best one could hope for. 

The crisp cold of spring bit into Riza’s ankles when she walked briskly along the street. For a moment she had debated taking the car, but something told her that today was not a good day for driving, and she usually listened to her instincts. She thought of the whiskey dripping down the drain and hated Roy for making her do it over and over again. The alternative was worse, but sometimes she wondered if she was destined to follow men around that required her to regularly get rid of high-percentage beverages for their sake. At least Roy always was grateful for her intervention. And still. And still. The tightness in her chest got worse. Riza tried to breathe through it, but she already knew that she would have to get through the day by force of habit alone. 

It was fine. She got to work alright, although the noise of the subway irritated her more than usual and caused Black Hayate to press against her calf as tightly as possible. Losing herself in the familiar routine of greeting her colleagues, changing into her working gear consisting of a t-shirt, leggings and sneakers that allowed her maximum range. For a moment she simply stood there in the changing room and leaned her forehead against the cool metallic surface of her locker while Hayate stood next to her, silent and alert. _Breathe_ , she silently told herself. _Breathe_. On days like these she made sure not to carry a gun with her, but she still missed the familiar weight of the weapon. 

With a deep sigh, Riza pulled her hair into a high ponytail and herself together, then she left for her first appointment. At least she did not have too many clients today; she would survive. She always did. 

Riza had started working at the clinic for physical rehabilitation as a physical therapist about six months ago, and usually the job filled her with a sort of quiet contentment she had thought lost for a long time after her honorable discharge and return to civilian life. It had felt natural to specialize in war veterans during and after her education and training. With Amestris being what it was, there were enough people who had lost limbs or suffered other physical damage that needed therapy in order to lessen pain, regain their motoric abilities and overall improve their quality of life. And they trusted her - recognized another veteran in her, saw her service dog and knew that she at least partially understood what they went through. It made things easier, but sometimes it also made them worse. Today it was a mixture of both.

She got through her appointments just fine, focusing on her work and the security of routine. Things only started to slip from her grasp afterwards, when she was done for the day and changed back into her street clothes. By then it was five in the afternoon, and slowly the fuzziness seeped into her surroundings. She knew she had eaten a sandwich somewhere in between, but could not really remember having done so. Her steps on the clinic’s polished floor seemed oddly loud. Dimly she wondered how much time she had left; she could already feel it coming. 

In the end, it was the sound of screeching tires that got her.

It was weird how it were always sounds like that that triggered her, and never fire or anything that came with it. Riza did not even see the car the tires belonged to. It did not matter; what mattered was the way the sound tore through her hearing like a siren, like one of the sirens back then, the sirens that should not have blared, should not have been activated, but something had gone terribly wrong -

Sand in her mouth. Dry lips;  
she can feel them crack underneath her   
probing tongue. There she is again, her legs  
heavy like lead, and there is   
the heat, the heat,   
and her heartbeat fast and quick in her chest, pumping blood through her veins until she   
chokes on it-   
they never tell you  
how much death stinks.   
_I’ll get you out of here_ , Roy says. Grabs her,   
blood   
running in rivulets   
from his face, and carries her out of the fire, the debris - 

A voice she did not know, alien to the scene. It was enough to make her think.

Had Roy ever succeeded? 

Had they ever left the fire behind?

Riza pulled at those questions, grabbed them firmly and forced her tattered brain to think. Then she opened her eyes, she found Black Hayate right in front of her, firmly kneading her thigh to ground her. She was sitting on the ground, no, crouching in a corner behind one of the low walls lining up the entrance of the clinic. 

And there was a woman in front of her, crouching as well in a safe distance, palms of her outstretched hands upwards to signal that she was safe while she talked to her. She was young, a few years younger than Riza at least, with long, very straight blonde hair held out of her face by a colorful bandana. Blue eyes. A firm mouth that curved into a small smile when she saw Riza look at her. Several silver hoops glinted along the outer lines of her ears. 

“You’ll be alright,” she said very softly and calmly without making it sound as if she were speaking to a child. “Breathe. You’ll be alright.”

It was all very mortifying, but her body was still thinking that she was about to die, and her mind was even slower to catch up, so Riza merely focused on Hayate’s paws and the low, calming sound of the woman’s voice while she tried to get enough oxygen into her system to survive. Her back ached, burned. She curled her fingers around Black Hayate’s harness and forced her eyes to stay open, to shake off the taste of sand in her mouth, the smell of burnt flesh and smoke in her nose, the bile in her throat. Was her heart really racing or was it just part of the memory? 

“Does this help?” the woman asked her. “Me talking? Are you with me?”

Was she? At least Riza knew what was happening to her, although she had been unable to prevent it from coming. And it did help. With Roy, it always was a gamble; his voice got her out of panic attacks and nightmares, but it made flashbacks even worse, and sometimes the lines were too blurry to know where one thing started and the other ended. But this was very clear for her brain: An entirely new voice of an entirely new stranger, someone who had no place in her memory. She breathed, then nodded. Words were still failing her, her tongue tied with ribbons of ash that effectively silenced her. 

“Okay,” the woman said. “I’ll come a bit closer, yeah?” She waited until Riza had nodded, then scooted a little more into her direction and smiled. “Okay. Breathe. This is Central City in Amestris, and it’s Thursday the …” She briefly checked the phone in her hand. “The twenty-sixth of March. Damn. Month’s almost over, hm?” 

Riza nodded again, lowering her face until Black Hayate could lick it.

“Your service dog is such a good boy,” the woman said. “Knew you’re in trouble and got my attention before he immediately went to your side.”

Riza gave her the tiniest smile and gently scratched Hayate behind his ears. 

“I’m Winry, by the way,” the woman said. “Winry Rockbell. I’m an automail mechanic, that’s why I’m here - I have a cooperation with the clinic. Are you working here as well or are you here as a client?”

Riza licked her lips. She found them smooth and free of ash. Somehow, a small part of her voice found its way through her clenched jaws. “Right now I’m not sure.”

Winry’s smile widened until Riza could see small dimples in her cheek. Cute, she thought absently, then was almost startled at the absurdity of the thought right here and now. “I think you’re doing great. What’s the name of that little fellow here?”

“Black Hayate,” Riza said. The words felt like cotton balls that swallowed the entire inside of her mouth. 

“Cool. I’ve got a dog, too - Den. She’s an extremely good girl, you know? Not the youngest anymore and she’s got a prosthetic leg, but she’s doing alright for herself. Do you want to see a picture?” Riza nodded, and Winry reached into the pocket of her overall - dusky pink, Riza noted faintly - to get her phone, scroll through it for a while and then angle the screen towards her. “That’s her, look. And that’s my granny next to her.”

There was an extremely tiny old woman smoking a pipe next to a dog who looked like an extremely good girl. Riza felt the corners of her mouth quirk up a little. Hayate continued to knead her thigh, and she slowly found it easier to concentrate on it. 

“Thank you,” she said quietly, not taking her eyes off the phone. 

“Don’t worry about it,” Winry said easily, not pretending that things were fine, but not turning it into drama as well. “I’ve got a bit of experience with stuff like that in my line of work, yeah? Do you want me to get you some water?”

Riza shook her head, swallowing all explanations to how the paranoia was too strong to accept something to eat or drink from a stranger right now. But she finally managed to move, reaching for the handbag that lay discarded next to her on the ground and getting her own bottle. The water washed away the feeling of cotton and ash in her mouth and she breathed deeply, something in her chest loosening enough to let in the tiredness. 

“I’m Riza,” she said, not because she felt she had to, but because she wanted to, and because it helped. Riza. Not Hawkeye, not Lieutenant, not The Queen. Just Riza, tired and on the ground after having experienced the kindness of a stranger. 

“Hello, Riza,” Winry said and gave her another of her warm, friendly smiles. “Nice to meet you.” 

“I’m sure you say that to all the women having a breakdown in front of you,” Riza said and immediately wondered where that had come from, especially in a situation like this. Perhaps Roy had rubbed off on her more than she had thought. 

Winry laughed, visibly surprised yet delighted. “You got me there. Hey, can I give you a ride somewhere? Or call you a cab?”

Riza hesitated. She did not want to ride the subway, but she also was not sure if getting into a closed space with a stranger was a very good idea right now. And she realized with a sinking feeling that she did not want to go home right now - home, where she did not know what to expect today, whether Roy would be in another bottle already or trying to hold himself together at the stitched seams. 

_I’ll get you out of here_ , he’d told her, so steady and sure, but sometimes she was not sure whether he’d ever made it out of there himself. 

“I think I’ll just take a walk,” she finally said softly. “But thank you.”

Winry hesitated for a moment. “Can I accompany you? I’m sorry, it’s just … you look like you could need someone to talk to right now.”

Riza looked at her a little helplessly. “You don’t even know me.”

Winry turned a little pink, and that was … interesting. “Maybe I’d like to.” 

Riza stared at her. Winry, still slightly pink but unflinching, stared back. And it was … nice, she realized. Unexpected, but nice. Perhaps she read too much into it. Perhaps that did not even matter. She thought about it for a moment, then nodded and, gently pushing Hayate off her, finally got up on her feet.

“Let me just text someone,” she said. “Is the park alright with you?”

Winry gave her a smile. “That sounds lovely.”


	2. A Heart, Painted Black

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bit of Roy angst to finish my working week. Always nice to have. Still no sign of Ed, that'll take two more chapters, but he'll make an impression then, believe me.  
> Title of this chapter is inspired by _Paint It, Black_ by the Rolling Stones, although I listened to the version by Ciara.

Roy knew Riza better than the back of his hand on most days, which was why he knew pretty quickly that something was going on. 

At first, he did not do anything but merely observe. That was the most important step in everything, after all: Gain enough data to be able to calculate the next steps while keeping everyone involved safe. He was pretty sure that whatever it was did not entail something too horrible or dramatic; in fact, Riza seemed better than the weeks before, her exhaustion lifted somewhat. Her routine - their routine - did not change, but she smiled more often and was a bit more patient with his entire being. And she used her phone more often, which meant that either Maes had finally convinced her to play Candy Crush, or she was thinking of a career in social media, or she had met someone new. There was only one way to find out. 

He started slowly and asked her about work over breakfast.

“It’s fine,” she said, smiling in a way that could easily be overlooked yet meant that she was proud of her work. And she should be, he thought with fierce devotion; she had worked hard, had pulled herself together even earlier than him and started to walk while he had merely begun to crawl. Endless nights where Roy had helped her with her studies. Endless nights after that where Riza had been dead on her feet, nightmares even worse than before because she was so tired from her training that her mind lacked resources to protect itself. And then she had gotten her degree and her job, and if she hadn’t he would have found a way to make these people see very quickly what an asset she was, what a brilliantly smart and devoted person. Of course they would never see the worst of what she was capable of, but that was perfectly alright. They got the best of her without the rest of it, and that was as it should be.

It did not get him closer to the answer, though. 

So Roy asked after her plants a day later. That was a quite roundabout way, but they did have a rather impressive collection of carefully labeled plants on their patio and he knew that she sometimes spent quite a bit of time in gardening subreddits to get advice for one plant or another. 

At that Riza stared long and hard at him and told him, “You don’t even know which plants I’ve got,” - which was pretty unfair because his smoking habit had become so much worse in the past few weeks since his graduation that he spent quite a bit of time on the patio, studying her handwritten labels. Not that he wanted to mention that fact.

When he inquired after her workout routine the next day, casually complimenting her healthy look and wondering whether she had changed anything about her routine, Riza looked at him even longer and harder. 

“Don’t do this,” she finally said very firmly. 

He blinked innocently. “I don’t know what you mean.” 

Riza was silent at that, then sighed. “What are you doing tonight? Do you have to work?”

“No.” She knew this, of course, since she had memorized his schedule as much as he had hers. Her question was a courtesy that Roy, in his more cynical, exhausted moments, called playing pretend at being normal. “Why are you asking?”

“You’ll make dinner for us,” she said firmly, “I’ll pick a movie. And then you’ll ask me right away what you want to know.”

“I don’t want to pry,” he said, which was incredibly stupid because they both knew that it was a lie. It reminded him of the first year after their return to civilian life, when it had been so hard to get rid of the rigid structures they had built over their seven years of service. Sometimes those structures still shone through, heavy skeletons that probably would never entirely fade because they had once relied on them to survive. 

“We both know you do,” Riza replied because things might have changed, but she had never, at any point, taken his bullshit and she had no reason to start now. “Make some curry.”

So while she was at work, Roy made some curry just the way Riza liked it, which was a lot less spicy than he liked and on the edge of an abundance of coconut milk. Then he spent a good hour lying in his bed and staring at the ceiling while he silently tried to motivate himself to get up, take a shower, shave and change into a clean shirt for the first time in three days. Ultimately he succeeded, then spent another half of an hour wondering why he sucked so much at the simplest things in life - although he knew, and although his therapist had a palette of fancy words for it. But still. Still.

By the time Riza came home, Roy had almost fully convinced himself that he was a properly functioning human being who absolutely had no astounding bouts of anxiety and fear of the future awaiting him, which certainly was a quite impressive feat of bullshitting. Even more impressive was probably the fact that he resisted the urge to get absolutely trashed and that, too, was an accomplishment he wanted no praise for. So he merely smiled and hugged her in greeting, a little surprised when she clung to him a moment longer than necessary. That could only mean she was tired or struggling or a mixture of both. Roy rubbed slow, gentle circles into her back with his mere fingertips until he could feel Riza relax bit by bit. 

“I’ve got ice cream, too,” he said because he had the feeling she needed to hear it, and indeed he earned a small smile.

“Thank you. I’ll take a quick shower and then we can have dinner.”

“Sounds lovely,” he replied and watched her go, and wondered not for the first time if their lives would be easier if they could simply be married and in love the way other people were. The way Maes and Gracia were. But Maes had said _No_ where Roy had said _Yes_ , and he had never been tangled in special ops with or without Gracia, which probably made all the difference. That, and the fact that a certain part of Roy had been broken even before that, which was something Maes with his lovely daughter and wife would never have to worry about. 

It didn’t matter. What was romantic love, really? Idiotic, that was what it was, in his case helpless pining for someone who was in love with someone else for over a year, which, of course, had broken his heart although he had been genuinely happy for Maes and Gracia when Maes had told him - they were both lovely people and deserved the best. But did it matter whether Roy and Riza loved each other romantically, whether they fucked or not? What did that say, really, about love more than how he had seen her that first time when they had both been kids and taught her how to throw darts to keep her from crying, or how she had held his hand while he had gotten colder and almost bled to death, or how she had looked at him when he had carried her out of the fire during his last, final fuckup -

He flinched when Riza touched him, then realized that he had wandered outside onto the patio again, cigarette between his lips. He could not remember how he had gotten there or when, but Riza stood there in his hoodie and her pants and looked at him with the barest hint of pain in her expression, and suddenly he felt so incredibly tired. 

_I’m so tired of the violence,_ Riza had told him once during their first months back in civilian life, in one of those nights where neither of them had been able to sleep and where she had obsessively cleaned her rifle, again and again and again, the sound grating on his nerves until he had bitten his lip bloody. _I’m so tired of the violence_ , she had said very calmly, sitting in their safe living room in a peaceful quiet, and her words had haunted him ever since. He was tired of it, too. 

“You ready?” she asked and he nodded, taking a final drag from his cigarette before releasing a cloud of smoke into the air and leaving the stub in the ashtray next to the door. 

“Sure,” he said and followed her inside, closing the door behind him. 

They ate on the table like civilized people because that was what they were, that was what they had worked for the past five years, and Roy gave Riza a polished version of his day where he focused on his phone call with Maes, his workout, his flirt with a lovely single mother at the supermarket and the intense debate he had had with an incredibly dense person on Reddit, leaving out the dread and the almost permanent feeling of iron shackles dragging him underwater, the inhaled cigarettes and the alcohol that constantly danced around the edges of his consciousness.

“You need a hobby,” Riza said quite firmly.

“I’ve already got one,” Roy replied. “I just told you.”

Riza flattened her mouth into a thin line regardless. “Endlessly long and needlessly heated debates with incels and capitalists on the internet do not count as a hobby.” 

“You’re right,” Roy replied with a solemn nod, “they’re a necessity.” 

Riza regarded him with one of her trademark looks of exasperation. “I liked the phase where you read one trashy romance novel after the other better.”

“Well, now that you mention it, I think there are a few Danielle Steel novels I haven’t read yet.”

“I take it back, go be uncomfortable on the internet,” Riza said, but the corners of her mouth were quirked up in utter amusement and that really was all that mattered. She in turn told him of today’s clients: the battered forty-year-old veteran that had chronic stiffness in his arms from badly healed scars, the only recently discharged woman that needed to work with her new automail leg, the soldier that had lost their right hand and could still feel it. 

“I’m so proud of you,” he said, because he was and she needed to hear it. “You’re doing an amazing job. All these people can be glad to have you, you know.”

Riza’s smile softened her entire face. “Thank you. I’m trying.”

“You’re doing more than that,” Roy said.

Riza hummed, then gathered their empty plates and started doing the dishes. They had considered getting a dishwasher two years ago, then found that doing the dishes actually helped grounding both of them in certain moments, so in the end they had not bothered. 

“When will you start with your training at court?” she asked over her shoulder.

Roy briefly considered smashing his head against the table until he did not have to answer that question anymore. Instead he cleared his throat and went over towards her to clean the dishes she handed him. “I haven’t decided where to apply yet.”

“I can help you select a few choices,” she offered. 

“Sure, that’d be great,” Roy said because the alternative would have been to release a scream loud enough to deafen both of them and rip a sizable tear in his lungs in order to fully convey his feelings about the matter. Instead he decided to deflect from himself and spare them both the anguish by asking lightly, “So what are we watching today?”

“ _Pacific Rim_ ,” she said.

Roy blinked. “Do you want me to say what that sounds like, or …?”

Riza sighed very deeply. “It was recommended to me and we should be fine trigger-wise - lots of water and snow, not much sand. A few scenes could be troubling, but I know where they are.” Roy watched in astonishment as her cheeks darkened a little. “I got the info where to skip to and what happens during the minutes we miss.”

“Is that so,” he said slowly. “What’s it about?” 

The real question he wanted to ask was _Who recommended that movie to you after you told them our triggers?_ He was not even sure whether he was offended or not; he could have been, probably, but he mostly felt surprised. Despite her preference for clear, no-nonsense communication, Riza usually was secretive and not easily trusting. It took new people a while until she opened up to them and told them things that really mattered.

“Well, it’s set in the future and there is this bunch of people fighting aliens from the sea by using giant robots that are controlled by two co-pilots sharing a mental link” she said and Roy wanted to remark that it sounded exactly like the sort of insane, over-the-top drama he adored when she added a little more softly, “That’s the short version of it, anyway. I was told that it’s a love story without a love story, and that’s why it’s so good.”

Roy looked at Riza for a long time, but he swallowed all of the words bubbling up inside him and hummed in confirmation instead, and so ten minutes later they found themselves in the best corner of the couch, sharing a blanket they did not really need while their shoulders and thighs brushed from their proximity. Black Hayate had found a spot to their feet and yawned, and Roy scratched at the thin sheen of frost at the outside of the box of ice cream while Riza started the movie. They watched for a bit, the intro at least until where the narrator said _The deeper the bond, the better you fight,_ and that was something he was very familiar with. He looked at Riza and Riza looked back, smiling a little in that way that indicated she was thinking the same, and that only confirmed that they would have been amazing as a Jaeger team. 

“So,” Roy said after she got up to skip the scene where one of the brothers died, sparks frizzing and flying, and handed her the second spoon as soon as Riza had settled back more comfortably. “To whom do we owe the pleasure of this movie?”

“Her name is Winry,” Riza said and dug into the ice cream. “I met her last week at work. She’s an automail mechanic. Very sweet. Funny, too.”

Roy raised an eyebrow and curled his lips into a knowing smirk. It came easy to him by now, just like flirting, and just like flirting a lot of it was performative, a habit formed by long years of watching and listening and imitating an interest that had always eluded him. Perhaps he was a little obsessed with it, that part of him that had always been broken, like someone repeatedly opening a wound instead of letting it heal. He had never told anyone that everything around sex and seduction usually felt hollow to him, not even Riza, and no one had ever asked or wondered. 

Riza raised her brows back at him and looked adorable with the spoon hanging between her lips before she swallowed and said, “Yes, maybe I’m interested in her.”

“Why haven’t I already seen her then? Are you losing your touch?” he gently teased. It would not have been the first time Riza had brought someone with her for one night before politely telling them goodbye forever the next morning after coffee. She did not do it often, but sometimes it happened, and he never knew whether he was relieved that at least she brought them here where she had the environmental advantage and he could immediately help her in case anything went wrong, or whether he loathed the intrusion of a stranger and the uneasiness that came with it. 

Riza hummed and did not reply right away. Roy knew better than to press her, and so they silently watched the movie for a while. 

Just as Roy was starting to really focus on what was happening on the screen, Riza said very calmly, “We went on a date.”

That was the moment where Roy dug into the ice cream as well while he indicated her to continue talking. 

Riza eyed him for a moment, then said, “It was nice. There’ll be another one. I think I’d like you to meet her.” 

“Not in the usual fashion of meeting someone in our kitchen in their underwear or on their way out?” Roy asked, which was an unnecessary and cruel thing to say and they both knew it. He was not even sure why he’d said it, since the only gain was Riza’s face that hardened in a way indicating that she was hurt. 

“Well,” she said tightly, “I just told you I’m considering something more steady, so you can stop slut-shaming me.” She breathed out. “I can’t believe it. You’ve been so much worse than me when we were younger. You’ve never even had a relationship that lasted longer than a month.”

“I’m sorry,” he immediately said and looked at her. “I don’t know why I said that.”

“Don’t do it again,” Riza said, but her shoulder brushed his again and she dipped the spoon in right next to his.

“I won’t,” he promised. “I guess I’m just surprised. You didn’t seem interested in more than flings before.”

Riza shrugged. “She’s someone I’d like to be friends with, even if something more than that doesn’t work out.” And then she smiled in a way Roy had never seen before, although he knew her better than the back of his hand on most days, and she said, “She makes me laugh. I don’t know. I just think she’s fascinating. There’s something so … refreshing about her. You’ll like her.”

“No doubt,” he replied, although he could already feel the rising, inexplicable dread in his heart, a blackness and darkness that drenched his tongue and swarmed through his veins until he was not sure he was still alive. _Don’t leave me_ , he wanted to beg and hated himself for it because he knew, he knew that it was not a competition, that she would never because it did not work that way, love did not work that way. Oh God. Oh God. He sat very calmly next to her and shared the ice cream without tasting anything while his heart raced like a spooked horse, and he hated himself for it. This was not about him. This was not the kind of person he wanted to be. Oh God, but what if he just turned into that kind of person no matter if he wanted or not? No. Someone - maybe his therapist, maybe someone else - had once told him that one was beautiful when one did beautiful things, and certainly that applied to being good by doing good things. And he wanted to be good, at least a little, at least for her, to make up for all the black ichor inside him. Riza had been hurting for a long time now, and if there was someone who made it a little better for her, this little life, this endless existence - well, who was he to deny her? Who was he to start grieving something he had not yet lost? 

She smiled when Roy put an arm around her and pulled her closer, cheek brushing her temple. 

“So, when will I be able to see her and give you my professional judgement?” he asked solemnly and at that, Riza laughed her quiet, mirthful laughter that was barely more than a breath.

“Give it a little time,” she replied. “You’ll meet her soon enough, if things evolve the way I’d like them to.”

“Alright,” he said and tried not to take her words as a threat.


End file.
